YCBA Collections Search

Commissioned by the YCBA, Shonibare’s sculpture addresses the eighteenth-century triangular trade between West Africa, North America, and Europe of enslaved people, animals, and goods. The female figure, a personification of Britain’s empire, stands on a globe that depicts the world as it was understood by the colonizers. Her dress is made of Ankara, a fabric associated with West Africa but first introduced by the British and Dutch. The birdcage symbolizes the colonial belief that humans and other living beings could be held as private property.
The three birds refer to those presented to Princess Augusta in 1753 by Mrs. Eliza Lucas Pinckney, owner of a South Carolina slave plantation. Here they are free, an acknowledgment of West Africa’s eventual independence.

Gallery label for installation of YCBA collection, 2025

This sculpture was created specifically for Enlightened Princesses: Caroline, Augusta, Charlotte, and the Shaping of the Modern World, an exhibition on view at the Yale Center for British Art from February to April 2017. It interprets the documented encounter between Mrs. Eliza Lucas Pinckney, owner of a slave plantation in South Carolina, and Augusta, Princess of Wales, in London in 1753. A female figure—at once the Princess, Pinckney, and a personification of Britain’s transatlantic empire—stands precariously on top of a globe that depicts the world as it appeared at the time of the meeting. Her dress references the original silk damask garment worn by Mrs. Pinckney but uses Yinka Shonibare’s signature material—Dutch wax-printed cotton textile, a fabric associated with the countries of West Africa. The figure’s head is replaced with an open cage and representations of birds that Mrs. Pinckney presented to Augusta: an American goldfinch, a painted bunting, and a blue linnet (or indigo bird) are all shown to have taken flight. The sculpture raises questions about the relationship between Enlightenment culture and oppression; reason and dishonest compromises with the truth; and the Enlightenment’s promotion of liberty with its tolerance of slavery. It invites frank conversations about the past and encourages reflections on the legacies of empire and slavery today.

Gallery label for installation of YCBA collection, 2018